We have been reporting on the fact that biologically-derived cellulose can be co-processed with coal to manufacture liquid fuels, with the attendant benefits of carbon dioxide offsets and sustainability.
We had earlier made a number of reports on the use of algae, intensively cultivated at sources of carbon dioxide generation, such as coal-to-liquid or coal-fired power plants, to capture and recycle emitted carbon into more raw material for liquid fuel manufacture in an appropriately-designed coal-to-liquid process, where algae could be co-processed with coal.
Herein is further documentation that algae can, in fact, be processed via coal liquefaction technology into liquid fuels.
The excerpt:
"Co-liquefaction of Micro Algae with Coal Using Coal Liquefaction Catalysts
Na-oki Ikenaga, Chiyo Ueda, Takao Matsui, Munetaka Ohtsuki, and Toshimitsu Suzuki
[Unable to display image]Department of Chemical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Kansai University, Suita, Osaka 564-8680, Japan
Co-liquefaction of micro algae (Chlorella, Spirulina, and Littorale) with coal (Australian Yallourn brown coal and Illinois No. 6 coal) was carried out under pressurized H2 in 1-methylnaphthalene at 350−400 °C for 60 min with various catalysts. Co-liquefaction of Chlorella with Yallourn coal was successfully achieved with excess sulfur to iron (S/Fe = 4), where sufficient amount of Fe1-xS, which is believed to be the active species in the coal liquefaction, was produced. The conversion and the yield of the hexane-soluble fraction were close to the values calculated from the additivity of the product yields of the respective homo-reactions. In the reaction with a one-to-one mixture of Chlorella and Yallourn coal, 99.8% of conversion and 65.5% of hexane-soluble fraction were obtained at 400 °C with Fe(CO)5 at S/Fe = 4. When Littorale and Spirulina were used as micro algae, a similar tendency was observed with the iron catalyst. On the other hand, in the co-liquefaction with Illinois No. 6 coal, which is known to contain a large amount of sulfur in the form of catalytically active pyrite, the oil yield in the co-liquefaction was close to the additivity of the respective reaction with Fe(CO)5−S, even at S/Fe = 2. Ru3(CO)12 was also effective for the co-liquefaction of micro algae with coal."
Although this report is complicated, it seems clear that co-processing coal and algae together into liquid fuels, as with coal and tree or crop-derived cellulose in other of our reports, leads to production improvements, as well as providing a direct and practical method to recapture and recycle carbon dioxide.